ALCONA — How many ways are there to renovate and add space to create a larger, more efficient and up-to-date Lakeshore library on Innisfil Beach Road?
The answer is rather challenging to calculate after four community sessions were held earlier this week to gather input from dozens of local stakeholders including town councillors, the Innisfil Public Library board, municipal and library staff, patrons and even a class of students from Nantyr Shores Secondary School.
Plans are underway to more than double the size of the existing 10,000- square-foot branch, opened in 2001. Innisfil Council has approved a $7.1 million budget for the expanded facility, including $5.4 million for construction costs.
“Earlier this year, we purchased an acre-and-a-half of land south of the library,” says chief librarian and CEO Susan Downs. “We always knew we were about books, but now we have so many electronic tools and things we are doing at the library are always changing.”
Gerry Shoalts, principle architect of Shoalts and Zaback Architects Ltd., who is serving as the design project leader, agrees wholeheartedly with Downs.
“Libraries have changed a lot in recent years,” he says. “What the Innisfil Public Library is embarking on is quite unique in Canada.
“We want users to think of their local library as a ‘community kitchen’. There have been a wide variety of ideas expressed, concerns and design proposals.”

Potential wish list items raised by participants in all the brainstorming sessions included making the updated building as “green” as possible and to incorporate the environment as much as possible. Features such as flexible space, outdoor play and reading areas, gardens, walkways and perhaps a small performing arts area were mentioned. Several students from Nantyr Shores even requested hammocks.
Groups were provided with a schematic of the new site and asked to place coloured blocks, representing program areas of the library, in a pattern they believed would be effective for library users.
“It’s a better building when you have a relationship with the environment,” Shoalts says. “It’s been a common theme.”
With the revitalization of Innisfil Beach Road, the branch’s new design “could open up more” to the roadway, increasing its visibility to passersby, Downs added.
The ultimate goal is to make the building a community hub where people can gather together, learn new skills and access technology and new media.
The importance of holding the public workshops was appreciated.
“It’s just crucial to see the (library) expansion and how we will incorporate young children, teenagers and adults under one community umbrella,” said Michelle Runge.
Dan Delisle added he was pleased to have the opportunity “to work with and have input with the architects.”
A public information session will be held early in 2013 and a draft design will be presented to Council, likely in February or March.
Downs anticipates phased-in construction, with parts of the Lakeshore branch remaining open, could begin in late 2014. The expanded branch could be in operation by early 2015.